A free word game NYT bought four years ago is now one of the most useful things the company owns. And it is about to be on TV.
The New York Times said Monday it is turning Wordle into an NBC game show, with Savannah Guthrie from "Today" hosting and Jimmy Fallon plus the Times serving as producers.
The show has been in the works for two and a half years, with NBC planning to start filming this summer and air the first episodes next year.
Guthrie and Fallon broke the news on Monday's "Today" show and called the show "fast-paced" and a "great family game" - a different feel from the puzzle, where players sit and think through guesses.
NBC is also looking for contestants, which means casting starts before a single dollar of ad sales lands.
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The Times is mid-pivot, with print sales falling and digital subs being the way the company grows.
Wordle has been a quiet hero of that pivot, after NYT bought the game in January 2022 from a Brooklyn software engineer named Josh Wardle, a deal that brought in "tens of millions" of new users.
Last year, players finished more than 11 billion puzzles across all NYT Games titles, up from 8 billion the year before, a level of growth the print business has not seen in decades.
For NYT, the games side is no longer a side bet, since it is one of the main reasons readers open the app every day.
This is the first time the Times has worked with a TV network on an entertainment show, a real shift for a company that for over a century mostly sold news.
A TV game show pushes the Wordle brand into a place subs cannot reach, with NBC paying the Times to use the IP while the show drives new viewers back to the app.
It is the same play every media firm is running, where a hit product gets pushed into as many forms as possible.
NYT did not say what it paid for Wordle in 2022. Four years and 11 billion puzzles in, the price tag almost does not matter.
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